I’m still pinching myself after reading Charles Kupchan’s eminently sensible Op-Ed on Egypt in today’s New York Times. I know it’s only a single Op-Ed, and couldn’t be further from the Times’s official editorial line. Even so, this piece feels as though it marks a change in “right thinking” attitudes toward the Middle East. For one thing, Kupchan speaks of religion and tribalism as barriers to democratization in ways that have been implicitly forbidden in Times-approved discourse up to now. I would like to believe that the stark reality of events in the Middle East might be forcing a rethink of American attitudes toward democracy promotion. Stark reality hasn’t counted for much over the past three years, but maybe that’s finally changing.